InsaneJournal

[fic] Hair-trigger
Pairing/Characters: Trowa, Duo. Mention of OMC Albert Singleton.
Rating & Warnings: PG-13 - for language and spontaneity.
Notes: Kookyfic™. Written for LJ's holidaysmut for Labour Day.   It seems somebody once known by the name no_utopia had more or less the same title for a fic of hers, if for totally different reasons. I never read it and only found out about it after the naming ritual of my own fic.

Summary: As a patch on the still bleeding post-war world, selected men in law enforcement have been ordered to flourish their facial hair.   Ah, the things I write for a giggle and a snort.



With Earth and the colonies rebuilding after the wars, the collective Earth government had thought it necessary to boost the people's morale; this year, Labour Day would be celebrated in a big way. Speeches, parades, concerts, live broadcasts all around the Earth Sphere – all for the benefit of those who had suffered both material and immaterial losses.


And that is how Trowa, being a Preventers agent, had ended up at an embarrassingly kooky Law Enforcement Moustache Competition for the benefit of thousands of war orphans. When he and his colleagues had received their briefing for this mission about three months back, he had mentally dubbed his branch Law And Moustache Enforcement; the board had picked a selection of virile men to represent Preventers and they were to take their task of growing facial hair as seriously as they would any other mission.

He had done his best. Cultivating a real moustache, however subtle it appeared on his upper lip, had demanded a lot of time and had caused him to rise earlier than he would have normally on work days.


Now, he sat in the make-up room, arms crossed over his chest, on a chair before a large mirror - a petite woman darting around him with brushes, pomades, and powdered cotton wads. As the moment he would have to get on stage drew nigh, the strange, clenching feeling in his stomach grew more intense; Trowa wondered idly if he would still be able to hide behind his hair once the girl was done with him.

"Mister Barton?" The make-up artist looked at him with a questioning smile. He mumbled an apology and raised his head, so she could neaten his soul patch and add a final layer of powder to his neck.

"You look a little tense, if you don't mind me saying so," she said. Trying to reassure me, Trowa thought, how nice. I wonder if she knows how many lives and how much property were destroyed by my hands.

"When you can't think of anything to say, just dazzle the audience with a smile and pretend whatever Alb asks you about is a secret, alright?"

She winked. Trowa knew the show host for this event, Albert Singleton, was a nosey bastard and a show-off. The girl was probably right that a vainer-than-thou attitude would be of more use to the orphans than a deadly stare-down. He sighed and flashed her a smile, to show he had understood her instructions; a quick glance at his reflection in the mirror as he did this, caused the clench in his stomach to tighten a bit.

"There is no reason for being nervous at all, handsome," the make-up girl continued, and then lowered her voice and leaned closer. "Alb's a dick-wad, but he's harmless."

Not knowing how to respond to this piece of information, Trowa got up. A tall, stringy woman with a clipboard guided him to some sort of waiting room, almost directly behind the studio, where he would have to wait until someone would come to get him for his stage appearance.


Trowa looked around the room, which looked like a modest canteen. There was a sign on the wall behind the bar, indicating the direction of the restrooms. He briefly considered going there; the woman who had directed him here had said that it would be another ten minutes before he would have to on stage. Trowa repressed the urge to rub his itching moustache and thought to sit down at the bar next to a middle-aged man he had seen at the office before, but before he had come to a final decision, he heard familiar laughter behind him.

Looking over his shoulder, he saw a braided figure entering the bar doubling up with laughter and laying his hand casually on the shoulder of a young man with a clipboard that accompanied him.

"Duo?"

Trowa hardly realized that he had thought out loud. The laughing man raised his head and looked directly at him, with a happily surprised expression. It was framed by chestnut side-burns, some version of a beard, and a light, almost red moustache.

"Man, Tro!" Duo said as he walked up to Trowa. "Of all the familiar faces I'd expected to see, yours is probably the last. How goes?"

Trowa's stomach looped. "Awful," he said, "they got to you too?"

"Are you kidding me? I had to pull quite a couple of strings to get permission to participate," Duo said. His eyes swivelled over Trowa's face as he put his hand in his pocket. "I'm an orphan too, after all. You know," a cock of the head, "that moustache actually looks good on you."

Trowa had thought – hoped that Duo would ramble on, in the enthusiastic fashion so characteristic to him, but that gaze rested on his and it made Trowa feel uncomfortable. He coughed and cast his look downward.

"Seriously. Nothing like these sheep I have dangling from my cheeks," Duo said, raising his hands, a box of Tic-tacs now in his left, and cupping them under his side-burns.

Trowa glanced up for a moment, Duo extending his hand to offer him a couple of mints, but was put off by the uncomfortable feeling of being appraised for aesthetic value. And that idiotic grin of Duo's was unnerving, just as it had always been. He declined the offer with a slight shake of his head. He coughed again and searched his mind for a change of subject.

"How is work," he managed, "whatever it is you do these days?"

"Mechanic for the company!" Duo smirked. "Work's good. Sweat, grease, and access to some really kinky old-timers." He popped a mint into his mouth.

"Cars," he added quickly, "Cars, of course."

Trowa's stomach corkscrewed madly as he realised he must have been giving Duo strange ideas by staring at him, wide-eyed. He looked around the bar again, to avoid eye contact.

"Never thought you the type for this sort of gig," the smirking braided mechanic continued. He put the box of Tic-tacs back into his trouser pocket. "Guess you were ordered to participate, huh?"

"Explicitly so, yes."

"Hey, Tro," Duo said, looking at his boots as he shifted his weight, "you want to meet up afterwards?"

With Duo preoccupied with his boots, Trowa ventured a look at his former comrade. He looked somewhat like a leprechaun, with all that fuzzy hair around his face. His beard would not grow above his jaw line, and the inch-long curly auburn hairs growing from just underneath were somehow incredibly endearing on that still youthful face. At least that grin had faded a bit.

"I mean, you know, just for a beer or something."

The braided leprechaun suddenly looked up, eyes all question. Trowa's stomach somersaulted.

"A beer," he dumbly repeated.

"Yeah. Or whatever it is you drink these days. You're probably a vodka guy, though – no-nonsense drink, vodka."


Trowa frowned.   I am a no-nonsense guy, he thought, with a no-nonsense mission to display my carefully groomed moustache, and a no-nonsense feeling of being on a rollercoaster.


"Make it a double."

Duo's returning grin felt like a blow to his gut. He turned his face away, feeling all too exposed with his bang fluffed up and put slightly to one side of his face. The itch to his moustache returned and he wondered how much was left of his ten minutes before showdown.

Something dark moving towards his face triggered the reaction to raise his arm in defence; he realized he had grabbed onto Duo's wrist only when he heard him laugh.

"Man, you're on edge. Haven't changed one bit, have you?"

The smile on Duo's face was mild this time, the look in his eyes less frantically happy than before. Trowa's stomach jolted and he felt his cheeks itch under his make-up, hesitating to let go of the unresisting wrist.

"You know what helps against stage fright?"

Duo's voice was gentle. Trowa eased his grip and lowered their arms carefully.

"Being freaking pissed off at someone. Or having a Tic-tac. – Or both."

The next moment, Duo's arm twisted rapidly to break free and grab Trowa's upper arm instead, pulling him closer and planting a sloppy kiss on his mouth. Duo's tongue had no trouble wedging itself between Trowa's unresisting lips, and at once, a minty taste bit into the tip of Trowa's tongue. The soft bristle of Duo's moustache against his upper lip and that warm breath against his lower as their mouths parted caused his stomach to explode in strange jitters and gave him goose bumps all over. Utterly surprised, Trowa moved his tongue and realized Duo had indeed given him a Tic-tac.


"Mister Barton, this way please," a man with a clip board said.

With a particularly impish smirk, Duo pushed him away.


Moustache And Tic-tac Enforcement, it went through Trowa's head as he approached the door that led to the stage. His little joke made him smile, in spite of himself.
Kooky or not, a mission is a mission; thousands of orphans depended on his performance. He was not sure if he really would dazzle the audience, but he knew that, for some reason, not even Albert Singleton would be able to make the smile on his face disappear.